


fill in the blanks

by lumberwoof



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: Gen, mentions of the Earp's shitty homelife, spoilers for 2x11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-22
Updated: 2017-08-22
Packaged: 2018-12-18 17:50:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11879679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lumberwoof/pseuds/lumberwoof
Summary: Wynonna's presence is always there, even when they can't remember her.





	fill in the blanks

**Author's Note:**

> a different take on some of the scenes in 2x11

There’s something strange about being in a Shorty’s shirt, as if she shouldn’t be wearing it anymore. Maybe she’s just ready to quit and move out of this godforsaken town. But lunchtime is fast approaching and it’s time to bring Nicole her usual - chicken salad sandwich.

Waverly shakes her head a bit, corrects Nicole to Sheriff Haught, and can’t understand why she made the slip up, when she’s sure that she’s never made it before. She tries to think back, knows that she brings Sheriff Haught lunch everyday, knows that she’s been working at Shorty’s too long, that she’s engaged to Perry Croft but something about that just doesn’t feel right. When she tries to focus on specific memories, her brain goes fuzzy, like it’s listing a synopsis of facts and not drawing from actual memories. Like her lived experiences have been reduced to a footnote.

She stops trying to force it and the fuzziness fades, but something still feels off-kilter.

Waverly makes Nicole’s sandwich (Sheriff Haught, her brain corrects again, and how does she even know the Sheriff’s first name?) and goes to add pickles, then stops. Two parts of her brain are warring with each other - one is firm that Haught doesn’t like pickles, never has, and she’s never put them on Haught’s sandwich before, but another is adamant that she has to, that there’s a reason for putting them there, but she doesn’t know what that reason is.

She adds pickles to the sandwich and hopes that’ll be okay.

_(In another universe, Wynonna all but collapses over the island in the station’s kitchenette, digging into her sandwich with equal parts vigor and distaste. Nicole makes a face at her._

_“No one ever puts enough pickles in my damn sandwiches,” Wynonna complains. “Not since Shorty—”_

_She cuts herself off and sighs, taking another bite of her sandwich._

_Nicole looks down at her sandwich, at the sliced pickles still attached on the toothpick and brushed off to the side because she doesn’t like them. “You want mine?”_

_“You sure?”_

_“Yeah, I don’t even like ‘em.”_

_“Haught damn, thank you ma'am!”_

_Wynonna takes the pickles without needing anymore encouragement and Nicole pretends to be disgusted when Wynonna slips them into her sandwich and takes a big bite, grinning madly._

_The next day, the two meet in the kitchenette again, Wynonna takes her pickles again. “Why don’t you just tell them that you don’t want pickles on your sandwich?” she asks._

_“Maybe I don’t say anything so you can keep stealing them,” Nicole says, with that bright grin and that makes Wynonna smile despite herself._

_It takes another three days before Wynonna realizes that Nicole’s answer wasn’t entirely joking.)_

* * *

She shouldn’t be sad that someone as awful as Doc Holliday is finally dead. _(She should be an absolute wreck because, oh god, Doc Holliday is dead.)_ And it’s the same thing as before, two parts of her heart are warring with each other and nothing feels real. But Nicole - Sheriff Haught, she keeps correcting, and is thankful that at least she never slips up out loud - is there and something about this whole thing is just so familiar and so comforting.

There’s a scent in the air that eases her, too, something that brings an inexplicable warmth to her chest, but she’s not quite sure what it is yet. It takes her a minute to figure out exactly what it is, and something in her heart swells.

“Sheriff Haught? You always smell like vanilla dip donuts.” She can’t explain why that makes her heart so warm, only knows that the scent is important to her. So important she can’t stop smiling.

_(“Holy shit, there’s donuts left?”  
_

_It’s sometime before seven in the morning and Wynonna is, surprisingly, at work. Less surprising is that she smells like whiskey and is clearly hungover, nursing a cup of coffee._

_“Yeah,” Nicole says, not entirely pleased with how Wynonna handles herself even with the badge around her neck. But she bites back the judgment, keeps up her personable charm. “Bullpen’s gonna fill up soon though, so if you want one, you better take it now.”_

_“Copy that,” Wynonna murmurs, looking through the assorted selection. She settles on a maple dip. “Damn, no vanilla dips?”_

_“You’re getting a free donut and complaining about it?”_

_Wynonna shrugs, unashamed. “Vanilla dips are the best. Anyone with a working tongue should know that.”_

_Nicole bites back her urge to roll her eyes and instead offers a polite smile. “I’ll keep that in mind.”_

_The next day, Wynonna stumbles in early again, looking haggard, and Nicole gestures to the donut box. “There’s a vanilla dip, this time.”_

_“You sure know a way to a woman’s heart, Haught. Shame you aren’t a dude.”_

_Nicole’s smile tightens and she thinks_ “That’s kind of the point” _but doesn’t say it._

_“You’re welcome, Deputy Earp,” Nicole mutters to herself after Wynonna disappears into the Black Badge office with her donut. Nicole wonders if she’s doing this solely to get an in with Black Badge or because the more she hears about Wynonna, the more she feels like Wynonna could use a few nice things in her life._

* * *

_Waverly is still getting used to this new Wynonna. This person who is so very clearly the same Wynonna as she was before, but more driven, more reliable, more present.  
_

_She doesn’t remember much of their childhood together, and the bits that she does, she doesn’t like to dwell on. The things she does remember are just memories of Wynonna being gone. Of Wynonna, barely fifteen, sneaking back into the house and reeking of liquor._

_Wynonna stumbling through the house, getting into screaming matches with Curtis and Gus.  
_

_And some part of Waverly aches because she sees now how unfairly Wynonna was treated, but another part of her also can’t forget the way Wynonna had looked at her and told her she’d be better off without her and then hopped on the next bus out of town. As if she was oblivious to the fact that Waverly had never really had anyone other than Wynonna to begin with._

_As if she forgot how their father treated Waverly, how Willa treated her, how their Mama left even though everyone swore up and down how much Wendy had loved her youngest most of all. And sure, Gus and Curtis are nice, but they aren’t Wynonna._

_But Wynonna’s back now and Waverly just wants to savour it, even if she can still see all that past behaviour that digs up every red flag in Waverly’s brain. That tells her Wynonna’s going to skip town and hurt her again, that Gus was going to be right about getting her hopes up._

_The days go by and Wynonna stays, working with Black Badge at the police station. She starts coming back to the homestead smelling less and less of whiskey and smelling more like those horrifically sweet vanilla dip donuts she loves so much._

_Wynonna’s smile reaches her eyes now, and she’s more affectionate with Waverly, always reassuring her and encouraging her. And yeah, there’s a lot of things changing very suddenly in Purgatory, but this is one change that Waverly is happy for._

* * *

_For Nicole, it’s rinse and repeat at the cop shop for the next few days, though now Waverly Earp comes in and out of the office, too, and Wynonna shows up a lot less hungover. One morning, the Earp sisters show up early, and Wynonna instantly heads for the donut box, like she’s been instilled with some sort of Pavlovian training. Waverly leans on the counter near Nicole’s desk but looks at Wynonna and smiles._

_“She seems happier,” Nicole says._

_“I think she is,” Waverly says, never looking away from Wynonna as the smile on her face grows._

_Nicole is enraptured.  
_

_The next morning, there are two boxes of donuts waiting in the kitchenette, and one very clearly has “BBD” written on top. Wynonna shoots a look to Nicole as she opens the box and sees two vanilla dips in the box._

_Wynonna picks up the entire box and heads into the Black Badge office, a beaming smile on her face. Waverly trails behind and looks at Nicole. “Thank you,” she mouths from across the bullpen.)_

“They’re my favourite,” Waverly says, even though she can’t recall a single instance of herself ever eating a vanilla dip donut, only that the scent invokes a warmth inside beyond compare.

* * *

“Dying might be our only chance of living,” Waverly says, feeling wild and so not like herself but also more like herself than she’s ever felt. “Who’s in?”

“No, no, no,” Jeremy says, waving his hands.

Nicole grips her hand tight, and Waverly looks up at her.

“Where you go, I go,” Nicole says, like it’s the simplest thing in the world. Like she isn’t afraid at the possibility of dying, only that she might get left behind.

And god, the thought of Nicole dying makes something churn in Waverly’s stomach.

_(“We all love Nicole, baby girl, and there is no way she is dying today.”)_

Waverly squeezes her eyes shut.

“For Wynonna.”

Nicole takes in a deep breath, all her fears of Waverly dying suddenly easing out of her body at the sound of Wynonna’s name.

_(“I’ll save my sister, you know I will.”)_

“For Wynonna.”


End file.
